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Fairfax, VA May 18, 2012 – JM Design has earned four awards for its communications work for the World Food Program USA including a Platinum Hermes Awards for the organization’s 2011 award ceremony materials. WFP USA’s annual report earned two awards, a Gold Hermes Award and a Communicator Award of Distinction from the International Academy of the Visual Arts (IAVA). WFP USA’s brochure also earned a Communicator Award of Distinction. These are the first communications awards WFP USA has received.

With thousands of entries received from across the United States and around the world, the Communicator Awards and the Hermes Awards are two of the largest and most competitive awards programs honoring the creative excellence for communications professionals.

“It is a pleasure to work with Ann Morris, vice president for communications and outreach, at WFPUSA. She sees the value of bringing on a design firm from the get-go. This is a huge advantage when trying to create a successful campaign,” said Jennifer Moran, Owner and Creative Director of JM Design. “It is an honor to receive creative awards. Nevertheless, we will always work tirelessly for our clients in order to achieve visually compelling and strategic pieces that supersedes their initial vision. ”

“These awards are proof that small, talented teams can do top-quality work while at the same time staying focused on the mission to feed hungry people around the world,” said Ann Andrews Morris, vice president for communications and outreach at WFP USA. “Our design team, led by Jennifer Moran of JM Design andour in-house team worked seamlessly to develop materials that are creative and effective at telling the story of our work and encouraging people to get involved.”

The Communicator Awards are judged and overseen by IAVA, a 550+ member organization of leading professionals from various disciplines of the visual arts dedicated to embracing progress and the evolving nature of traditional and interactive media. Current IAVA membership represents a “Who’s Who” of acclaimed media, advertising, and marketing firms including: Condè Nast, Coach, Disney, The Ellen Degeneres Show, Estee Lauder, HBO, Keller Crescent, Monster.com, MTV, Polo Ralph Lauren, Sotheby’s Institute of Art, Tribal DDB, Victoria’s Secret, Wired, Yahoo! and many others.

The Hermes Creative Awards are administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals. The international organization consists of several thousand marketing, communication, advertising, public relations, media production, web and free-lance professionals. The Association oversees awards and recognition programs, provides judges and sets standards for excellence. The competition has grown to one of the largest of its kind in the world. A look at the winners shows a range in size from individual communicators to media conglomerates and Fortune 500 companies. The competition is so well thought of in the industry that national public relations organizations, local ad clubs and local business communicator chapters are entrants.

2011 Honors go to:

Archbishop Carroll High School marketing brochure entitled, Learning and Leading by Example, won a Gold award in the category of Publications/Brochure; and an Honorable Mention for Design/Publication Overall. The purpose of the marketing brochure was for Archbishop Carroll to tell their story by expressing through words and images their catholic values, academic programs, service to the community, and future achievement.

The Campaign for Public Health Foundation, Where is Public Health? and Disease Surveillance infographic newsletters won a Gold award for Community Relations, as well as a Platinum award for Design/Illustration/Graphic Design. The illustration of the community was designed to highlight how pubic health experts are working in communities to prevent disease, prolong life and promote health.

We are grateful to all of our clients for the opportunity to use our expertise and strategy in order to create high-end and innovative communication pieces. We strongly believe in working with our clients as partners. This type of relationship produces successful results, not just with awards, but more importantly with core messages being well received, and understood, by our clients targeted audience(s).

One thing to keep in mind regarding awards is they should be highlighted with your boards of directors, members and/or donors, to prove your communications budget is being well-spent.

We hope our clients are as proud of these communication awards as we are here at JM Design. Cheers!

I recently took a class combining my love for sewing with graphic design. The class, Fabric Postcards, was given by G-Street Fabrics in Falls Church, Virginia.

My first card of the day, is the bird entitled Spring Bird. I started with the background fabric and ironed it on to TimTex (a sturdy lining type of fabric with iron on glue on one side). Then I did some free motion sewing in yellow. I decided to cut out shapes to create a bird, and attached it to the card using various free-motion sewing techniques. I had some rick-rack in my bag so added that to the bottom of the card to give the bird a base; and also added the felt flowers that I bought from Michaels. The finishing touches were the red stitch around the card and adding the netting over top of everything. The back of the card is a plain yellow fabric. This was mostly a card to play with different types of techniques, fabrics, etc. I was fun to see it come together.

My second card of the day, Sunset, was to create a landscape with various fabrics. I also had some white paper flowers (from Michaels) in my bag so stuck them on. I used some metallic thread to create the flower stems, and also did some free motion stitch to the “sky”. I decided to use a black stitch on the edge to contrast against all the pink. I really like how this one turned out. I can see the many possibilities!

If I had designed these without any embelishments that stuck off the card, I could have post mailed them. The other change would have been to add paper to the back of the card. Instead I used fabric. The next postcards I am making will be post mailed. The only key to that is to have the postoffice hand stamp them. My instructor told me it’s possible. I will post an update with how that went. I hope they don’t get destroyed.

I really enjoyed this class. It was a fantastic creative outlet from being on the computer all day.

Back in May, I was delighted to find out that a magazine I Art Directed and designed for won a Platinum Award from Hermes Creative Awards. The Hermes Award is an international competition for creative professionals involved in the concept, writing and design of traditional materials and programs, and emerging technologies. Entries come from corporate marketing and communication departments, advertising agencies, PR firms, design shops, production companies, web based innovators and freelancers. It’s an honor to have my peers see the value in the writing and design of a project I worked so hard on.

Hope Magazine 2010 - cover

Hope Magazine is a 38 page, full-color magazine and was fully funded with a grant from the California HealthCare Foundation on behalf of my client, Children’s Hospice and Palliative Care Coalition. No advertising appeared in the magazine which offered a good flow throughout the magazine.

I was deeply grateful for the honor to provide my creativity on such an impactful piece. This magazine was a collaborative effort between myself; my client, Children’s Hospice and Palliative Care Organization; and Poala Bruni of WritePath Strategies who provided a vision and editing. The subject matter is sensitive—children’s hospice—so the design needed to balance heart-felt and real-life stories, and at the same time provide important, timely and valuable information on hospice care. The target audience are the families of children in hospice, healthcare professionals, lawmakers and donors.

The second Platinum Award came today, from the MarComm Creative Awards. http://www.marcomawards.com/

I heard just last week that Children’s Hospice received another grant from the California Healthcare Foundation to produce a second issue of Hope Magazine. I am grateful for the opportunity to work on it again.

Ever since I moved back to DC from Philly in 1998 I have been going to the Hirshorn. To me, it’s the best place to be in the DC museum scene. I love the museum “in the round”. The huge paintings by Jackson Pollock in one of the main rooms is awesome to look at. The sculptures, metal art, video room, and other pieces always amaze and inspire me. Hmm, maybe I’m due for another field trip down there soon.

The architecture itself didn’t inspire me though. So, I was especially excited to see this article today in the Washington Post about an artist being brought in to add some life and dimension. Specifically, the book store, which is – for now – on the main level. I’ve always wondered why they used such a beautiful space for the bookstore and nothing else… money. Seemed like a waste. Well, looks like I’m not the only one that thinks this way. Read the article to find out more. Other details too about adding some life to the facade of the Hirshorn as well.

Some of you know that I love birds. I have been enjoying taking photos of them out my office window, which is at ground level. I lure the birds with a birdbath, landscaping, and a bird feeder. My cat, Minx, loves watching them as well.

I think it’s good for every graphic designer to give back a little, especially locally. Plus, it feels good to do pro-bono work for a good cause, like Mother’s Against Drunk Drivers. I met, Karen Horowitz, the Development Officer of the Virginia Affiliate of MADD a few years ago when she worked for another non-profit that I donated to. We stayed in touch and she pinged me about this project.

She needed a logo for their up-coming event called MADD Dash. It’s a 1K that is tacked on to another, longer run. The first MADD Dash is this October 24th in Manassas. Unfortunately, I am out of town, otherwise I would run.

This event is targeting kids, so she asked that the logo be fun. The only other parameters was to use their wordmark (MADD in block letters), use their PMS color red, and keep the logo to two colors to keep production costs low. Other than that, they told me to have fun and show them a few concepts.

I first played around with the word DASH. It screamed “motion” to me loud and clear. I was playing with the different effects in Adobe Illustrator and came across, Scribble, which with some tweaks, gave me exactly what I wanted. The little cartoon legs were the perfect touch to the DASH and also kept with the motion concept I wanted. The block letters in MADD, is a nice contrast to the jagged DASH effect. The final logo includes a shoe print in the background. This was not part of my original design, but they saw it in another concept and asked that I try to incorporate it in this one. Smartly, they asked for two options of the final logo, one with and without the shoe print. The one without is for t-shirts, hats, etc.

I didn’t put up much of a fuss about including the shoe imprint. The logo was fun, I had fun doing it, and the client was happy. From Karen, “Jen, Thank you soooooo much! You are awesome! I’m completely excited about this logo.” What more could I ask for?!

So, all you graphic designers out there, reach out to your local non-profits. They have fun events, and you can explore some techniques you might not normally use with your hum-drum corporate clients. Plus, your neighborhood non-profits might need some help during this tough economy. You might give their events an added boost with a little pop and polish that only a graphic designer can bring. And, you might get something out of it too!

Just last week, AIGA DC, had a screening of a documentary called “Died Young, Stayed Pretty“, about the indi-rock poster design culture. I figured I would attend since i’m always looking to be inspired. Doing some pre-film research, I saw how creative these poster designs, and the designers who create them, are.

Unfortunately, the documentary was not well done at all. Not only was the sound terrible, there was no narration to help the viewer know the stories of the designers, or how they themselves were inspired. I left in the middle of the movie.

After coming home, I decided to put the my wasted hour at the AIGA event to good use by doing my own research on the poster culture scene. I came across this other, much better documentary called “American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art“. It just came out this summer and unfortunately there are no dates for the film to be seen in D.C. at this time. I will keep checking back though.

There are so many designers in this film that i’ve embarrased to say i’ve never heard of like Art Chantry, Chris Shaw, COOP, Frank Kozik, and more. And, I’m even more embarrased to say I had no idea about the rock poster art scene, but can say that i’m a huge fan now. When I was first starting out in design, I expiremented a little by using the photo copier machines at work, taking masking tape and placing it on top of the black “design” I sent through the copier and then tore off the tape. What was revealed was a textured graphic that gave some dimension to the original, flat, design. Then, I would scan it in and add color to that design. Who knew I was using techniques used by some of these rock poster desigers. Makes me feel kind of good that i was experimenting on my own. I need to get back into that!

These poster designers have done posters for rock bands like: Death Cab for Cutie, Elvis Costello and Moby, to name a few. In my simple research, the artist I am drawn to the most is Leia Bell. I love the colors she uses, the juxtapostion of the words and the graphics, and the texture of the posters.

I will be looking for a project where i can use these techniques again, or maybe i’ll create my own project!